


kill a word

by duchamp



Category: Sicario (2015)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-15
Updated: 2015-12-15
Packaged: 2018-05-06 20:43:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5430179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duchamp/pseuds/duchamp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The glass double doors to the consulate open, and a ghost steps out. She looks different. It’s been a year and a half, give or take, since Alejandro last saw her. Of course she looks different—hands on her hips, hair braided down her back, skinny jeans hugging every non-existent curve on her body. “Just my fucking luck,” Kate says, and gives Alejandro a once-over, eying him up and down. She chuckles, mirthless, without humor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	kill a word

“You need to understand; she was barely alive when we found her.”

 

\--

 

Alejandro likens the pursuit of revenge to possession. There’s a purpose, greater than you, stronger than your sense of self, which settles, makes itself at home, in your body. You’re not an individual anymore, you’re simply a vehicle. Stops and detours aren’t an option. Relationships, _people_ , exist to be used. Cultivated and discarded.

Alejandro throws Kate Macer out with the rest. And someway, somehow, she finds her way back to him. It’s a first, to say the least.

 

\--

 

Kate reminds him of his daughter; with her need to draw a blunt line between right and wrong, with her unshakeable faith in the inherent goodness of people. Problem is, Alejandro’s daughter was a child and Kate’s a grown woman. There’s a lifetime of accrued habits, moral clauses, and codes housed in Kate’s small body that—when brought to face harsh reality—make the inevitable fall harder to deal with.

Kate’s untethered and alone, surrounded by men she doesn’t know in a world she doesn’t understand. There’s no rule book here. There aren’t any socially conscious politicians looking over their shoulders either, waiting to answer for their transgressions in front of flashing cameras and a hungry media. No; Matt’s task force operates on the fringes, in the dark. And Kate certainly understands violence, knows it intimately. What Kate doesn’t know, what she’s never had, is the ability to do anything without red tape holding her back.

It’s clear, after the border skirmish. Kate accepts cigarettes from others with eagerness and hunger, her back bent with the weight of the day’s events. The fear of what she’s expected to do is written plainly on Kate’s face, along with the fear of what she’ll be capable of without politics or bureaucracy keeping her in check.

Alejandro doesn’t begrudge Kate her fear, doesn’t hold it against her. He understands. He was in her shoes once.

 

\--

 

“You should move to a small town,” Alejandro says, affidavit in his pocket, Kate’s signature dry and securing the task force clemency. Giving their actions a sanctioned, domestic blessing.

He disassembles her pistol, Kate staring vacantly off into space; shaking, sweating bullets, tears still wet on her cheeks. She needs to leave here. A position with CPS would suit her. Or the Red Cross. Amnesty International. Anything but this.

Kate’s still young, in her late twenties. She can reinvent herself, become someone new. Become someone other than a girl Alejandro and Matt beat to a pulp and threw out into the cold.

 

\--

 

The smell of fresh tar hangs in the air. The roads outside of the Consulado de México en Tucson have been newly paved. Alejandro leans against the side of the Chevy on lend for the assignment, staring down a pair of shrub trees sticking out of the malnourished soil. This DEA agent, his charge, has kept him waiting—Alejandro checks his watch—for the past twenty-seven, no, make that twenty-eight, minutes. Never any respect for punctuality in the states. They should be on I-10 by now, booking it to the border. As it stands, Alejandro’s already facing a handful of nights in cheap motels and a diet of fast food.

No planes, the DEA said. As low-profile as possible, they said. And Alejandro didn’t argue. Not that they would have listened to him. Alejandro’s just here as additional security, the bottom of the barrel as far as positions go. The grime on the lowest rung going up the bureaucratic ladder. ‘Escort’ is the official title they gave him for this. Sounds better on paper. Lackey, more like. Babysitter, Alejandro thinks. Still, it pays.

The glass double doors to the consulate open, and a ghost steps out. She looks different. It’s been a year and a half, give or take, since Alejandro last saw her. Of course she looks different—hands on her hips, hair braided down her back, skinny jeans hugging every non-existent curve on her body. “Just my fucking luck,” Kate says, and gives Alejandro a once-over, eying him up and down. She chuckles, mirthless, without humor.

“Where were you?” Alejandro asks. Because, really, what the fuck else is he going to say?

“It’s a Sunday,” Kate says, “I was at church.” She walks over to the Chevy, Nike tennis shoes kicking up dust. “You really didn’t know it was me?”

Alejandro shakes his head, and Kate laughs again. “This is a change of pace,” she says, throwing her duffle bag into the backseat of the car. “You being in the dark instead of me. I think I like it.”

 

\--

 

Sunlight spills in through the car windows, blinding and bright, reflecting off the tops of buildings and the railings lining the freeway. Horns honk. Music plays loudly, bass thumping, volume turned up too loud, coming from a passing Toyota pickup truck. There’s the calls of birds, migrating in from the north. Kate’s window is rolled down on the passenger side. She leans out, chin cushioned on her shoulder. Her eyes are closed. A smile stretches when the breeze hits her face. It’s ninety-eight degrees, and Kate’s wearing a ribbed long-sleeve t-shirt and a jean jacket. Her skin shines, oil and sweat trickling down.

“You should take off your jacket,” Alejandro says. “It’s quite hot.” He looks over at Kate who’s, in turn, looking out the window. She doesn’t respond. They’re the first words Alejandro’s said, the first words spoken between either of them since they left Tucson, and he’s ignored.

They drive for another hour in silence before Kate rolls up her window and stretches, rolling her neck from side to side. “I booked a room for the night in Las Cruces,” she says. “Take US-70 East. The motel is about twenty minutes away.”

“We should keep driving,” Alejandro says. “Get in a couple more hours.”

“I have to check in with my boss.” Kate’s tone leaves no room for discussion. “We’ll do the longer leg of the trip tomorrow. Rest up in Laredo. Monterrey isn’t going anywhere in three days.”

 

\--

 

Alejandro doesn’t ask what, or who, is in Monterrey; doesn’t ask why Kate’s now with a division of the DEA. He doesn’t ask any questions at all. He doesn’t need to. His job is simple: get in, drive, protect, get out, and get paid. And although it’s Kate who he’s been charged with protecting—someone who he never thought he would see again, the living embodiment of the collateral damage left in his wake—Alejandro can roll with the punches.

“You could have called your boss from the car,” Alejandro says. Because it’s worth saying. It’s a seventeen-hour drive to Monterrey from Tucson. Him and Kate could just nip it in the bud and cover the distance in a day. Nothing an energy drink and a couple shots of espresso can’t cure.

Kate gives him this look from where she’s sitting on the sofa. _Really_ , it reads. Or it could be interpreted as _shut the fuck up_. “No calls,” Kate says, laptop perched on her lap. “E-mails. Encrypted. Phone lines aren’t secure. You know that.”

Alejandro does know that. He didn’t even think about that. Maybe being around Kate has knocked him for more of a loop than he’s willing to admit. Alejandro settles for silence again. He looks out of one of the motel’s grimy windows, covered in bird shit and mold. The view of Las Cruces greets him, mountains spanning out into the distance. Miles upon miles of peaks and valleys. A purple and blue haze settles over the plateaus and ridges, the sun going down. The clouds hang low, blurred tuffs of white, and the expanse looks unbearably endless. For forty dollars a night, it’s a pretty unbeatable view.

 

\--

 

Life is like poker.

Sometimes, a person will play their cards close to the vest. They’ll keep their mouth shut and their baggage tucked down deep. They’ll give away nothing. No clue as to who they truly are. Another will tip their hand. Just the slightest bit. Enough to intrigue, to present a question to be answered. But not enough to lay it all bare.

Tip of the hand: Kate leaves her duffle bag open on the motel room floor. And that’s when Alejandro sees them—tucked between a travel-sized Bible and a change of clothes—three prescription bottles, labels face up. Flexeril. Muscle relaxant. Ten milligrams. Three times a day. Ambien. Sleep aid. Five milligrams. Once a day. Codeine. Pain reliever. Sixty milligrams. Taken as needed.

Alejandro glances over from the prescription bottles to Kate, who’s still sleeping. She’s curled in on herself, legs bent. The blankets are pulled all the way up to her neck. Her hair is tangled and matted, covering her face. She looks like someone who wants to disappear.

 

\--

 

The bar they stop at in Laredo is a hole in the wall. Dirty and dilapidated. Meaning it’s free of tourists, and they probably serve the best drinks. Alejandro orders two burgers with fries. He’s about to order a pair of beers too, but Kate stops him. “I don’t drink,” she says.

“Since when?” Alejandro asks.

“Since it became a real problem for me,” Kate says. “I quit awhile back. Twelve-stepping it and everything. Got my one-year chip about three months ago.”

“Soda water, then?”

“Please.”

Alejandro tells the bartender, and gets a number for their orders. He turns and sees Kate waving him down, already at a booth. Alejandro goes over, drinks in hand, and sits across from her. The seat groans under his weight like it’s about to splinter. He places the soda water in front of Kate, who’s undoing her braid. Sections of hair unravel, falling forward to frame her face. She slides the elastic band onto her wrist. “Thanks,” she says, and takes a sip from her glass while Alejandro nurses his beer. “Can I be honest with you?” Kate asks.

Alejandro shrugs, the ice-cold malted taste from the beer running a welcome trail down his throat. “Sure.”

“I suck at small talk,” Kate says.

Alejandro recognizes a show of truce when it’s offered. “So do I,” he replies.

 

\--

 

It’s raining when they leave the bar. Heavy sheets fall, Mother Nature apparently having it out for the whole county. Something ugly must be brewing in the Gulf, Alejandro thinks. The road to the motel has been converted into a shallow swimming pool, and Kate’s soaked through when they get there. Alejandro’s no better: clothes a second skin. Rain-water is up to his ankles, filling and spilling out of his shoes.

“Wet dogs,” Kate mutters, once they’re finally in the dry shelter of their room. “The pair of us.”

Bags all dropped on the floor, a sopping pile on the carpet, Alejandro goes to stand by the radiator. Kate runs to the bathroom, a change of sweats balled up in the crook of her elbow, toeing off her shoes and socks. She tries to close the door, but it won’t shut completely. Hinges rusted and used up. A sliver of light peaks out where the door is jammed. “Dammit,” Alejandro hears Kate say under her breath. Then, the sound of the faucet running and the hiss of steam.

Alejandro decides to pick up their bags from where they’ve been unceremoniously dropped. He passes the bathroom—sees Kate through that tiny open space. And he would look away, but Kate’s clothes are stripped off and her body is… shredded. Spit back out of a combat zone. The flesh is pocked, puckered, and rough. Patches of scar tissue, too many to count, are surrounded by clear and unmarked skin. Looking like small islands.

Kate catches his gaze. Naked, vulnerable, and embarrassed; a deer caught in the headlights. “Get out,” she says. Low, monotone, calm. Threatening. And Alejandro knows she could hurt him if she wanted. Never mind the difference in weight, in size, in years.

He leaves.

 

\--

 

It explains a lot: the layers in one-hundred plus degrees, the need to cover up. The DEA. The pills. The alcoholism. All these new facets to Kate that Alejandro’s been introduced to over the past two days. It starts with the scars, he’s sure. How Kate got them—if it was somehow inadvertently connected to Alejandro and Matt’s coup de grâce… no. _Don’t think about it_.

The Chevy is a flimsy and shaking shell, hail starting to tap at the windshield, rain coming down violently. Lightening strikes ahead, the clap of thunder quickly following, and Alejandro checks his watch. It’s nearing midnight. He’s been outside for the past three hours, since Kate told him to leave. He was expecting to sleep in the car. But with the weather like this, it would be an ugly gamble. Alejandro decides to go back in and let Kate rail at him. It would be an entertaining story, if anything: DEA agent offs her additional security while on assignment. Brilliant. Water-cooler talk gold, right there.

Kate’s seated on one of the double beds when he gets back. She’s staring at the floor, unmoving, hair toweled dry and wearing a pair of sweat clothes. Alejandro comes up to her slowly, waiting for her to tell him to leave again. Or to scream at him, hit him. But she doesn’t. He sits on the other bed and Kate says, “You weren’t supposed to see that.”

Alejandro says nothing. He doesn’t apologize. He also doesn’t ask Kate what happened. He knows what it’s like to have strangers gawk at your history, asking questions they simply aren’t entitled to ask. For people to pry, getting off on being voyeurs to someone else’s pain. Alejandro had enough of it with every federal and intelligence branch in the states; his sob story carried down the grapevine. No matter how private he tried to keep it, sometimes it would get out and become fodder for the break room. His constituents would look at him with such nauseating pity it made him want to throw up. So Alejandro won’t ask. No matter how much he might want to. If Kate wants to tell him, she will.

She does.

“It happened a week after I left the task force,” Kate starts, and Alejandro can tell that every word is costing her a bit of herself. “A week after you last saw me. You played a damn fine number on my head, you know that? I couldn’t leave my apartment for days, held up in there. I finally had to, to get groceries. I got back, and before I even had time to put the vegetables in the refrigerator I was hit from behind. Out like a light. I woke up chained to a bedpost by my ankle, in some house in the suburbs. The windows were boarded up. Like in one of those fucking horror movies. I could barely move as it was, I was so drugged out of my mind. Found out later it was dope. They were giving me a steady IV of heroin. Enough so I was conscious and lucid, but completely powerless. I remember looking at my leg, my arm. Hell, my fucking thumb. Just willing them to move, and they never did. 

It was just simple beatings at first. Fists. A baseball bat. Then, they brought out the sander. They got inventive with cigarettes. Broke dishes and used those. I can’t remember how long I was there until—” Alejandro swallows roughly, knowing what Kate’s going to say next. He could write this himself, with all his knowledge of what the cartels do to their female victims. It happened to his wife, after all. “There were three of them,” Kate whispers, and leaves it at that.

“Was it us?” Alejandro asks. _Did they come to you to get at us_ , is what he means.

“I honestly don’t know,” Kate says. “They never interrogated me. Never asked any questions about ops I’d been apart of or raids I’d led. All they said was, ‘You deserve this.’ Over and over. I thought I was going to die, there. I was as good as dead. But I didn’t. The DEA stormed the place, looking for drugs. They found their drugs. And then, they found me.” Kate takes a deep breath. Inhales and exhales. She scrubs at her face, nervously fidgeting; looks to Alejandro and lifts up her sleeves, pointing to the thin and long horizontal scars along the underside of her arms. “These were me. I wanted to die after it happened. Tried to kill myself. Took a handful of pills with orange juice and booze and slit my wrists in the tub. Reggie found me. I held it against him for a long time.”

Alejandro nods. He almost did the same, after seeing his wife’s head on display and discovering his daughter, his little girl, was gone. Eradicated. After going through a trauma of those proportions, the need to see your own blood spill is a compulsion. To inflict harm on yourself means you still have some semblance of control over the situation. Over your future, or lack thereof. In the end, for Alejandro, the desire for vengeance won out instead. “Then you went to go and work for the DEA,” he says.

“Yes.” Kate rolls her sleeves back down; rubs at her wrists self-consciously. “It’s how I built myself back up. I built myself back up on my hatred of them—the cartels, the enemy. Hating them, and loving what they haven’t managed to touch. What they haven’t managed to ruin.”

“They haven’t ruined you,” Alejandro says.

Kate offers him a sad smile. “Yes, they have.”

 

\--

 

He doesn’t know Kate Macer and she doesn’t know him. For all intents and purposes, they’re strangers to each other. Still, Alejandro wants to help. The need to provide Kate with some form of comfort is unnerving. Like a filling in his tooth. A foreign object, an extension of his body, he now feels the weight of. Alejandro’s never been one to psychoanalyze himself, but it’s rather obvious if he thinks about it: Fausto’s dead. A decade long hunt completed. And Kate’s here. Perhaps Alejandro’s simply supplementing one aim for another—the need to see blood spilt switched out for the need to soothe.

Or it could just be the cabin fever talking. Yes, Alejandro thinks, taking a drag of his Marlboro, it’s the cabin fever. But Alejandro’s never been much of a fool, and the thought dissipates like so much cigarette smoke in the dank motel air. He’s lying to himself. He’s lying to himself and he knows it. “What can I do?” He asks, no preamble at all, and Kate meets his eyes from where she’s standing by the window, rain rattling the panes.

“Nothing,” Kate says, “unless by some miracle you’re able to clear the freeways and stop them from flooding. But I never took you for much of a Moses type, so.” She laughs, light, foot tapping against the floor, her own Marlboro joint hanging between her lips.

“No,” Alejandro corrects her, “I mean…” He can’t finish the sentence.

“Oh,” Kate says, understanding, and takes a quick drag of her cigarette. She lets out a stuttering breath, smoke coming out on an exhale. Alejandro notices her hands are starting to shake but Kate tries to hide it, wrapping her arms over her chest.

“I didn’t mean to upset you,” Alejandro says.

“No… no, it’s fine. Don’t apologize, I’m—” Kate stammers, shaking her head. She closes her eyes and a private smile plays across her face, like she’s having a laugh at her own expense. “I was going to ask… never mind. It’s insane.”

Alejandro puts his cigarette out. “I’m listening,” he says.

“Fine,” Kate responds, and walks over to where Alejandro sits. She stands above him, a hair’s breadth away, eyes issuing a challenge all their own. “I want you to fuck me.” And the words are clinical, as if Kate were dictating directions to him on the road. Her veneer crumples after the initial demand though, and Alejandro thinks she almost resembles an insecure child; unsure of how to ask for what she wants. “There hasn’t been anyone, since...” Kate sighs, trying to explain. “I haven’t talked about it, except with a select few people. Friends. I couldn’t figure out a strategy, how to broach the conversation. Imagine going out on the third date and hoping for the girl to finally put out and then she drops a bomb like that. No. Wouldn’t go over well—”

“Stop,” Alejandro cuts her off. He reaches out to cup the space where Kate’s thigh and her knee join together. Slowly, giving her time to stop him. “Yes,” he says, before he can think better of it.

Before he can talk himself out of it.

 

\--

 

This is a bad idea. Alejandro has no plans to stop, but it’s still worth admitting to himself. This is a bad idea.

The sheets are rumpled, though the bed is still made. Kate’s underneath him, bare; her hair fanned out, tangled, a halo round her head. She never wears perfume, but when Alejandro dips his head down and kisses her skin he recognizes the clean scent of the motel’s soap. He reaches between her legs, pauses. “Is this alright?” He asks, and Kate nods. A low-level anxiety still rolls off her in waves. But when Alejandro presses the heel of his hand on her, eyes still locked with Kate’s, his fingers come away wet.

“Shit,” Kate groans, and she squeezes the back of Alejandro’s neck, moves as if to kiss him. He pulls back, shakes his head no. Kate has to know: what they’re doing, here and now, is about her. It’s not about him. Alejandro refuses to let it be about him. That would only open up a can of worms better left closed. So he kisses the hinge of her jaw, rolls one of her nipples between his thumb and forefinger, denying her his mouth. Kate trembles under him, breathes out a word that sounds like _yes_. Her nails run up his back. It feels good, better than it has any right to, and Alejandro moans.

Kate’s so small. Alejandro can count every single one of her ribs, could cup her middle in both of his hands if he wanted. He settles for grabbing at her thighs instead, spreading them. Kate’s knees bend and the soles of her feet rest flat against the mattress. Alejandro fits himself between her legs, slots forward in a single thrust, and Kate lets out this noise between a sigh and a scream. Alejandro stills, but Kate wraps herself around him. “Keep going,” she says, hands coming up to card through his hair. “Keep going.”

And Alejandro follows Kate’s directive, moves, kisses her this time before he can check himself. But it’s still quick, dry, and chaste—impersonal. A true kiss is too intimate for Alejandro to allow. Kate seems to understand, her mouth closed, lips pressed against his. She doesn’t try to turn it into anything more. If anything, she creates distance; tipping her head back, breath coming in shuddering gasps. Looses herself to it.

 

\--

 

The roads clear and they make it to Monterrey in record time. In a little under four hours, traffic not withstanding. A multi-car pileup stalls them for awhile near the border, which has Kate grinding her gears—nervously chewing the inside of her cheek, tapping her fingers against her knee. She’s got an edge to her, a glint in her eye; looks like she’s preparing to face-off with an enemy. And maybe she is. Alejandro supposes he’ll find out when he parks the Chevy outside of a maximum security prison.

Kate steps out of the car. “Let’s get this over with,” she says.

And yeah, it’s definitely personal. Bad blood has a stench all it’s own, and when Alejandro follows Kate into the interrogation room the entire place reeks of it. Process of elimination doesn’t even factor, when Alejandro sees the man with his hands cuffed to the table. He’s middle-aged, arms and neck adorned with elaborate tattoos, body a rod of muscle. Kate tenses up, ready to swing a punch or kill. It’s one of them. One of the three men from the suburban prison the DEA raided.

“Jesus,” Kate whispers. Angry, defeated. She turns on her heel and leaves.

 

\--

 

Kate takes off with the speed of a bullet. She’s a blur, her chest starting to heave with the weight of a panic attack, her face jaundiced and drained, her eyes wide saucers. She talks to one of the guards on duty. He takes his keys and unlocks a heavy door which Kate disappears through, leaving Alejandro behind in the hallway.

The guard eyes Alejandro. “She’s had a rough day,” he says in perfectly accented English. Wherever this kid went to school (and he is a kid, twenty-one at most) he didn’t fuck around with his languages. “You going after her?”

“No,” Alejandro says. He won’t follow Kate yet. The last thing she needs is Alejandro trailing after her as a second shadow. No one wants an audience watching while they fall apart.

 

\--

 

He finds Kate standing on the prison’s flat roof. She’s surveying the skyline, arms folded in front of her. A cigarette, nearly gone, glinting bright embers, is wedged between two of her fingers. “I was wondering when you would come up to look for me,” she says.

Alejandro goes to stand beside her, shoulder to shoulder. Kate’s eyes are shadowed black, cheeks hallowed out, face looking like a death’s mask in the darkness. “You know who he is,” she says. The words are soft, hurt.

“I took a guess,” Alejandro responds.

“Yeah,” Kate acknowledges, and stamps out the last flickering stub of her cigarette with her tennis shoe. “This was supposed to be closure,” she continues, “for me. The DEA needs intel on a sting coming up. And that bastard down there is an asset to them now, with his knowledge of networks in Mexico. These individual cells doing bitch work for the top dogs in charge. Running mules, robberies, kidnappings, you name it. I volunteered to come here. I thought that seeing him locked away, behind bars, would give me satisfaction. Just to see one of them…” Kate’s voice breaks. She chokes back a dry sob. “I thought I was stronger. I thought I had more self-control. But, seeing him, I realize I don’t. I won’t be able to sit there and question him. I’ll end up loosing it. I’ll lay hands on him. I’ll hit him. I won’t be able to stop. I’ll kill him. The cameras won’t matter. The guards won’t matter. What happens to me after won’t matter at all.” 

“Kate…” Alejandro pauses and swallows, his throat constricting and raw. He shouldn’t feel this much, just saying her name. “You’re strong. Get back down there and get what you came for.”

 

\--

 

True soldiers don’t yield.

Kate walks out of the interrogation room, as calm and collected as she can be. A notepad is tucked under her arm, new information scribbled on it. She leans into Alejandro, her lips against his ear. “Thank you,” she says, and pulls back. “Bring the car around?”

“In a bit,” Alejandro says.

And maybe they’re not strangers after all, because Kate sees right through him; knows what he’s going to do. “How?” She asks.

“Don’t worry about it.” Alejandro gives her arm as reassuring squeeze. “Actually, you should go to the car. I could be awhile.”

“Alright.” Kate’s learned when to stop asking questions. “Take as much time as you need.”

She walks off, and Alejandro spots the guard from earlier. The kid. Alejandro goes up to him, gestures in the direction of the interrogation room. “How about you get me in there,” he says, and slips six one-hundred dollar bills to the kid. “Give me ten minutes.”

The kid counts the bills, disbelieving. It’s a small fortune in pesos. He pockets it. Alejandro knew he would. “You’ve got five,” the kid says. “Try to keep it quiet.”

 

\--

 

They drive to a four-star hotel after. Engine sputtering and tires quaking over graveled road and patches of construction. Monterrey breathes and thrives, an animated being thrumming with life outside the confined space of the Chevy. Alejandro mentions budget restraints as they near their destination, argues they should find a place more reasonably priced. “I got the information I needed and the op’s finished,” Kate counters. “We should sleep somewhere decent.”

It’s an entirely different world, with the valet picking up the car and the floors of the lobby being so immaculate anyone could eat off them. Kate books a suite, and Alejandro figures this must be her way of blowing off steam. Coping. Kate hands him a key card, notices the dried blood crusted under his fingernails. The bruises blooming on his knuckles. “You should get cleaned up,” she says.

“Yes,” Alejandro agrees, and the shower he takes after they unpack their luggage almost convinces him Kate made the right call. The spray coming down on him is warm, not cold. There’s fresh towels. No mildew is anywhere to be seen, climbing green and black trellises out of the drain. Still, a good wash won’t wipe away the latter part of the day. It won’t help the man Alejandro left, bones broken and barely breathing on a prison floor. It won’t absolve Alejandro of feeling he was in the right, despite what Kate’s travel-sized Bible preaches. Old Testament vengeance and wrath revised in the New, voicing contrition and forgiveness. _They know not what they do._

Those proclamations have fallen on deaf ears for some time now, though. Alejandro wears his sins with pride. God and him made their peace long ago. Ten-years worth of mourning and prayer, to come to this conclusion: the lives Alejandro takes will never equal even one moment of his daughter’s or his wife’s.

 

\--

 

The blood is gone, but the bruises still mark his skin.

Alejandro leaves the bathroom, towel around his hips. Kate’s there, waiting. She’s tentative at first, coming up on slow-moving but steady legs, crowds up against him. Dry where Alejandro’s wet. Clothed where he’s all but bare. “You don’t need to do this,” Alejandro says, even knowing that Kate never does anything she doesn’t want to do. “You don’t need to do this,” he says again; the words more for himself, to save himself, to stop this. The first time was enough. The first time should be the one and only time.

“I know,” Kate says, her head bowed, tucked under Alejandro’s chin. Her mouth is at his neck, tongue and warm breath at his pulse point. “I want to.” And she trails kisses up his neck, stops when she reaches his mouth. There’s an inscrutable pause, Kate’s lips hovering over his. Alejandro considers pushing her away. He nearly does, before Kate leans forward and bridges the gap between them. The initial kiss is a closed, chapped pressure. Then Kate tilts her head, teases the seam of Alejandro’s lips with her tongue. Testing, waiting for reciprocity. Alejandro gives it, opens his mouth. He reaches for the nape of Kate’s neck, pulling her even closer.

The entire thing is soft, experimental, like a kiss between teenagers. It knocks something loose in Alejandro’s chest, makes him uncomfortable. He ends it, pulls back. Kate’s breathing is ragged, mouth spit-shiny and swollen. “Do you want to stop?” She asks, almost sad.

“No,” Alejandro says, truthful, and his fingers dip under the denim edge of Kate’s jeans. She takes the hint, steps back and takes them off; does the same with her shirt. Standing there in nothing but her bra and underwear she reaches forward, tugs the towel Alejandro wears away. Her hands span his hips and she rides up against him. Alejandro groans, a low rumble, when Kate repeats the motion again. He’s hard now, the friction welcome, pushing himself against her.

And just like that she’s gone from him. Space returned along with reality, reminding Alejandro that this started as a favor, nothing more. It wasn’t supposed to happen again. He was supposed to have a handle on the situation, he was supposed to… “Get on the bed,” Kate rasps. And it would be an order, if her voice weren’t splintering apart. Alejandro follows her lead, sits on the edge of the bed. Kate climbs unto his lap, her knees on either side of him. She takes him in hand, twists her wrist. Her grip is dry but the angle is right, and Alejandro exhales roughly. His muscles seize up and he bucks into her hold. It doesn’t take much more, and there’s this look on Kate’s face when he comes. Awe, Alejandro thinks. Reacquainting herself with someone else’s body after being alone for so long.

The effect is accumulative: Kate’s flushed, skin pink, when she kisses him. She tastes of the clean tang of toothpaste and Alejandro kisses her back, kisses her deeper, sloppy and wet and dirty; reciprocating, answering her. Kate moans, and something crests and breaks. Alejandro doesn’t know what. But it sets him off, and he rears forward like a man possessed—grabbing Kate’s face between his hands, strands of her hair threaded through his fingers. He hears a keening sound and realizes, distantly, that it’s coming from him.

This isn’t supposed to be what it is.

His hands go around Kate’s back. He feels, by touch, her bra-strap’s hook-and-eye closure. Undoes it. He slides her bra off, open mouth finding her breast. Kate keeps him there, cradling the back of his head, fingers a soft pressure against his scalp. Alejandro thinks he hears his name on her lips; thinks he hasn’t heard a more welcome sound in years. “Your hand,” Kate gasps, the words high-strung, veering towards desperate. “I need…” And Alejandro doesn’t hesitate, peeling her underwear to the side, sliding two fingers inside her. “God,” Kate chokes, breath coming fast. “Come here.” _Kiss me_.

Alejandro obeys, fitting his mouth over hers again. Their jaws knock together, his fingers building up a rhythm inside her. He wraps an arm around the small of Kate’s back, keeping her steady. She’s beginning to loose it, cut-off whimpers escaping from where their lips are joined. Her hips stutter forward, movements becoming erratic. He’ll probably regret this later, but Alejandro’s already too out of his depth to care. He pulls back, says—“Look at me.”

Kate does. She opens her eyes, dazed, lids at half-mast, watching him watching her. She’s beautiful, and Alejandro wants to ask her what she’s done; wants to command she gather up the pieces of himself she’s taken and give them back. He doesn’t say any of those things. What he does say is, “I want to see you come.”

And Kate shudders, clenches around his fingers. She comes, like she was just waiting for him to say the words. “Alejandro,” she mutters on an exhale, shaking apart, gripping at the base of his neck like it’s the only thing keeping her tethered to the earth. This has gotten so far out of his control. He can’t reign it back in, so Alejandro does the only thing he can do: holds Kate tightly to him, kisses her so he won’t have to hear her say his name anymore.

 

\--

 

The money is deposited, the journey completed, his next contract assigned. Some Colonel in Colombia gone too big for his breeches. Alejandro puts the car in park, says, “You take care of yourself.”

Kate reaches over the center console, takes his hand. She brings it to her lips, presses a kiss to the ridge of his knuckles. Her mouth is as warm as the Arizona sunlight beating down. “You too,” she echoes.

 

\--

 

A freelance agent is what he is. Employers call him by many names. Quick. Efficient. Connected. The silent type. A first rate temporary employee. Something rare to be appreciated.

“You disappear,” Matt told him during their first op together. “It’s a talent not everyone has.”

He’s a ghost. Alejandro passes through many places, and they pass through him. They leave an imprint, each and every one, both large and small. Memories cling to him. There’s his wife; wedding dress trailing after her as she walks across the floor of a tiny chapel. There’s his daughter; smiles, school plays, sack lunches.

And;

Her.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic has been my baby that I’ve been hard at work writing ever since I finished _the sermon in the suicide_. It’s been hard to let it go, but I’m so happy it’s finally finished. A sequel for this is in the works, and might see the light of day if I ever have the time to actually sit down and edit it.


End file.
